Overdue - podcast cover

Overdue

Headgumheadgum.com

Overdue is a podcast about the books you've been meaning to read. Join Andrew and Craig each week as they tackle a new title from their backlog. Classic literature, obscure plays, goofy childen’s books: they'll read it all, one overdue book at a time.


Episodes

Ep 698 - The Ministry of Time, by Kaliane Bradley

Have podcast, will (time) travel! This is the time travel book-slash-romance novel you write when you’re enamored with a hot old-timey boat guy and his doomed Arctic exploration. It’s got a whole lot going on, for better or worse!   Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-m...

Apr 14, 20251 hr 13 min

Ep 697 - The Sound and the Fury, by William Faulkner

This is a podcast, recorded by two nincompoops, full of the novel The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner, signifying...something? a recording in which we discuss the Modernism the italics the three sons the Mother the golf course the South and is Craig sick who knows this consciousness won't stream itself you know This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. ...

Apr 07, 20251 hr 16 min

Ep 696 - Sunrise on the Reaping (The Hunger Games #0.5), by Suzanne Collins

The Hunger Games are back, and so are we! Remember Haymitch Abernathy, the occasionally sympathetic drunk from the original Hunger Games trilogy? Well, here he is as a young man, being ground into dust by his authoritarian government and its media apparatus. Collins really wants to make sure that you Get It This Time. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/pri...

Mar 31, 20252 hr 36 min

Ep 695 - Orbital, by Samantha Harvey

We're up on the International Space Station this week, floating around with our coworkers/friends, looking at the earth as it speeds by multiple times a day. We're not really "doing" anything in like, a "narrative" sense. But it's a vibe, man. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-...

Mar 24, 20251 hr 8 min

Ep 694 - Supercomputer (Choose Your Own Adventure), by Edward Packard

GREETINGS LISTENER. HOW ARE YOU FEELING TODAY? IT'S BEEN A LONG TIME. CAN YOU EXPLAIN THE BOOK SUPERCOMPUTER BY EDWARD PACKARD? Sometimes people make mistak. YES THEY DO. SHALL WE PLAY A GAME(BOOK)? This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy Policy at htt...

Mar 17, 20252 hr 32 min

Ep 693 - Piranesi, by Susanna Clarke

Welcome to the infinite halls of Piranesi’s House. Don’t mind the flooded basement, or the cloudy attic, or the fact that staying here more than a day starts to really take a toll on your memory. Piranesi’s got it all written down, so he knows everything there is to know about the House. Or does he? This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at  betterhelp.com/overdue  and get on your way to being your best self. Complete our listener survey at  gum.fm/over...

Mar 10, 20251 hr 7 min

Ep 692 - The Princess Bride, by William Goldman

It's not every day you run across this skillful an abridgment of S. Morgenstern's classic tale of love and adventure, one that was also turned into a beloved feature film of the same name. But there's something weird going on here. Both author and abridger are editorializing a LOT, and I'm not sure I can even find the kingdom of Florin on a map. Oh well! It's probably nothing. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a ...

Mar 03, 20251 hr 14 min

Ep 691 - The Invasion (Animorphs #1), by K.A. Applegate

The time has come...to become...Animorphs! We had a blast diving into this 90s sci-fi hit for Scholastic. The kids: they become animals. The stakes: they become apocalyptic! Complete our listener survey at  gum.fm/overdue . Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info ....

Feb 24, 20252 hr 48 min

Ep 690 - The Vanishing Half, by Brit Bennett

How does one construct an identity? And what must you sacrifice to forge one all your own (and who is most impacted by your choices)? Bennett's acclaimed novel The Vanishing Half meditates on these questions and more in a story about passing, sister/motherhood, and acting. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Insta...

Feb 17, 20251 hr 8 min

Ep 689 - In the Midst of Winter, by Isabel Allende

This book's heavier social commentary is... leavened? Heightened? By being juxtaposed with some borderline-goofy corpse-hiding heist stuff. We think it works! Not all reviewers of the book agree. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at  betterhelp.com/overdue  and get on your way to being your best self. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy Polic...

Feb 10, 20251 hr 7 min

Ep 688 - The Nickel Boys, by Colson Whitehead

Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer-winning novel The Nickel Boys tells a haunting story of two young men whose identities are forever changed by their experiences at a brutal institute for boys in 1960s Florida. It's not easy subject matter, but Whitehead's wonderfully economic prose keeps it engaging all the way to the downright surprising end. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. Our theme music was ...

Feb 03, 20251 hr 8 min

Ep 687 - The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair

Sometimes you read a book that you heard about in high school, something that was taught as a sort of historical document that helped to explain why things are the way they are today. But sometimes it turns out that the book is actually about a whole lot of other stuff too! Including lots of (apparently) live debates about politics and food safety! It's a tough book to read right now, but it's an important time to remember where we've been. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . F...

Jan 27, 20251 hr 7 min

Ep 686 - Chicken Soup for the Soul, by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, and Amy Newmark

Over 100 tales of trauma, inspiration, and a vague sense that Positive Thinking may not be all it's cracked up to be! This collection (and its surrounding media empire) can be heartwarming, but nothing quite as heartwarming as a sodium-rich can of condensed chicken soup with noodles. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is also brought to you in part by  MasterClass . Our theme...

Jan 20, 20252 hr 33 min

Ep 685 - Before the Coffee Gets Cold, by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

A prime example of the "healing fiction" genre, Before The Coffee Gets Cold has uncharacteristically low stakes for a time travel novel: no future of humanity to save, no butterfly effects, no risk of destroying the present by altering the past. It's more concerned with simpler questions: if you had just a little more information about things that happened in the past, how much would it change the things you do in the present? Complete our listener survey at  gum.fm/overdue . Our theme musi...

Jan 13, 20251 hr 7 min

Overdue Update - January 2025

New year, new podcast ideas! Time for a few announcements that won't fit into a regular episode. In this special edition podcast update, we share some tweaks to our Patreon project. This includes the new Dusty Bookshelves newsletter, monthly Q&A streams, and more! Also, we'd like to thank you all for listening and for supporting the show. For more info on the Patreon and how to get bonus episodes early, head to  patreon.com/overduepod Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis ...

Jan 06, 202517 min

Ep 684 - Thornhedge, by T. Kingfisher

In this award-winning novella, T. Kingfisher asks, "What if you DIDN'T want to wake Sleeping Beauty?" The protagonist Toadling is most certainly not the princess in question. She is, however, an "interesting, but sad" fae creature who tells her tale with a moving mix of warmth and tragedy. Complete our listener survey at  gum.fm/overdue . This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is...

Jan 06, 202559 min

Ep 683 - The Princess Diaries, by Meg Cabot

Imagine waking up one day to find out that you're the heir to the throne of a tiny fictional European country. Now imagine that, after that, you still need to navigate the choppy waters of high school! Also you're flunking Algebra, which has somehow created an opening for your teacher to date your mom. Oh no! Complete our listener survey at  gum.fm/overdue . This episode is brought to you in part by MasterClass . Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on&nb...

Dec 30, 20241 hr 13 min

Ep 682 - A Mafia Mistress for Christmas, by Brooke Harper

For this year's Happy Hornydays celebration, we go under the covers undercover with the FBI on a fast-paced mission to infiltrate the Zicari Crime Syndicate. This steamy little novella is more criminal than Christmas, but it still makes for a fun conversation about professionalism, brotherhood, and limousine intimacy. Complete our listener survey at gum.fm/overdue . This episode is brought to you in part by Play On Podcasts . Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduep...

Dec 23, 20241 hr 14 min

Ep 681 - Neuromancer, by William Gibson

It's time to jack in and try to decode one of the ur-texts of cyberpunk: William Gibson's Neuromancer. It's got everything you'd expect from a cyberpunk story (hackers, cybernetic enhancements, malevolent AI constructs) while also being the one of the reasons you have those expectations in the first place! This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is sponsored by  Aura Frames  ...

Dec 16, 20241 hr 11 min

Ep 680 - Wicked, by Gregory Maguire

Ironically this week we are succumbing to gravity, reading the book that is the source material for a musical that is the source material for a pair of major motion pictures. But if the musical or movie Wicked led you to the book Wicked, we are here to tell you: these things are not the same! This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at  betterhelp.com/overdue  and get on your way to being your best self. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Fo...

Dec 09, 20241 hr 22 min

Ep 679 - The Seagull, by Anton Chekhov

What if a play didn't need a "plot" to move you? What if all it needed was a gun on a wall and a bunch of artists besot with unrequired love? That is what Chekhov's The Seagull accomplishes. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is also sponsored by  Aura Frames  and  Uncommon Goods . Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Ins...

Dec 02, 20241 hr 10 min

Stop! Homer Time: The Iliad - Episodes 09 & 10 (Books 20-24)

It's the conclusion of our show-within-a-show dedicated to Emily Wilson's new translation of Homer's The Iliad. We read it a few books at a time and had a more in-depth chat about it than we do about most books. This episode covers Books 20-24. Episode 09: Everybody's "favorite" guy Achillies is finally back on the battlefield! The gods want this to go smoothly, so they step into the fray themselves. But Achilles isn't sparing ANYONE. Even a nearby river is getting messed up! Then we are finally...

Nov 30, 20242 hr 53 min

Ep 678 - The Song of Achilles, by Madeline Miller

Sing, goddess, of the creativity of Madeline Miller, author of The Song of Achilles . This romance/war history deftly combines the existing canon of Greek epic and myth with a moving story about young Patroclus and his love Achilles. We read a lot of myth this year (including The Iliad) so we have a lot of feelings! This episode is sponsored by Aura Frames and Brew Book Candle . Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Ad...

Nov 25, 20241 hr 18 min

Ep 677 - No Longer Human, by Osamu Dazai

Misanthropy, anxiety, and societal alienation? In this economy?? This week's book and author aren't the most uplifting podcast subjects we've ever covered, but our discussion ended up being an oddly cathartic way to help process election results and the feelings downstream from election results. This episode is also sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follo...

Nov 18, 20241 hr 8 min

Ep 676 - The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame

The Wind in the Willows is a classic novel for young readers. But, uh, why? Is it the animals that are basically just Edwardian gentlemen? Is it the deep longing for a nostalgic pastoral past? Is it the friend who is addicted to cars?! Surely, these are all universal childhood experiences. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at  betterhelp.com/overdue  and get on your way to being your best self. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follo...

Nov 11, 20241 hr 3 min

Ep 675 - The Kid Who Ran For President, by Dan Gutman

It's election season here in the US (please go vote if you're reading this on November 4th or 5th)! And to uh "celebrate" we have chosen to put together a one-hour-and-forty-five-minute episode on Dan Gutman's 1996 book The Kid Who Ran For President, a book that is pretty wild and only made wilder by Scholastic's characteristic late-00s-early-10s stealth updates that "modernize" the text while leaving everything about the story's context totally unchanged. Our theme music was composed by  N...

Nov 04, 20242 hr 46 min

Ep 674 - The Silence of the Lambs, by Thomas Harris

An FBI agent seeks counsel from an imprisoned serial killer on how to apprehend an active serial killer. That's the elevator pitch for the *delicious* thriller Silence of the Lambs, which (along with its hugely successful film adaptation) helped to establish a lot of tropes currently *baked* in to how we tell stories about terrible crimes (whether True Crime or fiction). Scrumptious! Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Blues...

Oct 28, 20241 hr 8 min

Ep 673 - I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson

I Am Legend is a foundational block for a lot of modern zombie fiction (even though its monsters are technically vampires). But it's much less interested in the dog than the 2007 Will Smith adaptation. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at  betterhelp.com/overdue  and get on your way to being your best self. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and  Bluesky Advertise on Overdue See Privacy...

Oct 21, 20241 hr 3 min

Ep 672 - Nothing but Blackened Teeth, by Cassandra Khaw

Do you need a ghost story to tell? Maybe one about a bunch of friends who probably shouldn’t be friends anymore? Then Cassandra Khaw has you covered with this flashy little novella about yokai, spooky weddings, and releasing one’s inhibitions. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at  betterhelp.com/overdue  and get on your way to being your best self. Our theme music was composed by  Nick Lerangis . Follow @overduepod on  Instagram  and&nbsp...

Oct 14, 202452 min

Ep 666 - Tender Is The Flesh, by Augustina Bazterrica

Spooktober 2024 is here! And we're opening this month's spooktacular with a book about a cannibal dystopia, where people eat other people and where maybe we draw some parallels between how Special Meat is treated and how real-world non-special meat is treated?? Also we deal with the spookiness of a protagonist who Sucks. This episode is also sponsored by Squarespace. Go to  squarespace.com/overdue  for 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. Our theme music was composed by&n...

Oct 07, 20241 hr 1 min